


welcome (to the freak show)

by eggosandxmen



Category: School of Rock (2003), School of Rock - Lloyd Webber/Slater/Fellowes, X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Gen, Katie’s name is Kade (They’re Non-binary), Mutation, Teaching, X-Men AU - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-30 10:16:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19851067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eggosandxmen/pseuds/eggosandxmen
Summary: Dewey Finn lands a teaching job.Title from freak show by Ingrid Michealson.





	welcome (to the freak show)

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, the X-men AU none of you wanted.
> 
> Dewey actually has a degree in this! He teaches! His powers are whenever he listens to or plays music he can fly and do some shapeshifting! I love him!

The teaching interview is over the phone, thank God. Dewey’s not one for beating around the bush, but sometimes it’s just easier not to have to explain. 

He’s lucky- he _can_ pass as human, if he really tries at it. It’s just that he doesn’t want to, and it’s exhausting, and he can’t keep it up all day. At his last job, he just forgot- he was so busy talking to one of his kids that he forgot to keep himself on the ground with the pop song playing in his ears, and then his head hit the ceiling. One of the other teachers had called the cops.

Hopefully that won’t happen this time around.

He parks his van in the teacher’s lot and walks up to the building, fixing his hoodie over a stain on his shirt. 

The teacher’s room is full of uptight-looking older teachers, all so human he could feel the flatscan bullshit in the air. He smiles (shit, shit, he’s not fanged right now, right?) and waves. “I’m Dewey Finn, the new sub?”

“Oh!” A woman in a pressed suit walks up to him, reaching her hand out to shake. “I’m Rosalie Mullins. Here, follow me, your classroom is down the hall.”

He stumbles out after her, jogging to keep up. “So, I’m here for how long?”

“As long as Mrs. Jacobs is in recovery. There’s only twelve students in the classroom, all of them are… well, you’ll get used to them. Good luck, Mr. Finn.”

She hands him a key and walks back to her office, Dewey watching her go before taking a deep breath and pushing the door open.

The kids- his kids, now- sit at desks in perfect rows, hands clasped together on their desks. 

Oh, god, they’re all little valedictorians. What is Dewey supposed to do with this?

He waves, chuckling nervously. “Uh, hey. I’m Mr. Finn, your substitute for a bit.”

The girl in the front- black hair, perfect smile- stands up, a paper tucked under her arm. “Hello, I’m Summer Hathaway. I take attendance here.”

He notices that she’s barely speaking above a whisper, despite looking perfectly confident. Maybe she has a cold?

He gestures for her to continue and she walks up to the board, marking down the present list and then turning to him.

“As I said, I’m Summer. Next to me is Billy-“ the boy waves, hunched over his desk like he’s in pain- “behind us are Zack and Kade-“ they’ve got to be siblings, holding each other’s hands much too tightly and looking at him like he’s there to be some kind of drill sergeant- “and behind them are Tomika and Lawrence.” She points at them in turn- a spectacled boy and a tall girl next to him with small buns on the top of her head, holding onto the boy’s arm even as she waves at Dewey. Summer speaks up again.

“Freddy is all the way in the back for the time being.” The kid’s glaring at him, arms crossed. “In the next row are Marta, Alicia, Gordon, Frankie and Leo.” 

All of those kids are just as crushed together as the first row, sardined together between only a few desks. 

Okay, so they’re contact-prone. Dewey isn’t worried about it. “Okay, thanks. So, as you guys know, I’m gonna be your teacher for a while.”

At her desk, Kade flinches the second he speaks, Zack looking nervously at Dewey and taking off his blazer to place around Kade’s shoulders. Dewey stops talking until he finishes. “Everything alright there, kid?”

“Kade has sensitive ears,” Zack mutters, even softer than Summer had been. “It’s not a problem.”

Summer and Billy share a look and then look back up the second they notice him noticing them, Billy blinking owlishly. 

“Oh, okay, er-“ He quiets down as best he can, whisper-screaming. “Is this better?”

That gets a smile out of Zack, and he laughs a little. “Yeah, sure.” 

“Good! I’m gonna talk like this for the rest of the time!” He does jazz hands and grins. “Welcome to your new normal, you preppy toddlers!”

Summer rolls her eyes. “We’re ten.”

“Can’t hear you over my whispering!” He does finger guns at her. She rolls her eyes and Dewey shrugs then turns and sits down, putting his arms behind his head. “Okay, so, I had a long night, so today is a freebie.”

“Mr. Finn!” Summer protests. “You have to teach us.”

Seriously? What kids aren’t happy with a day off? 

The rest of the kids seem to have the same thought, Billy elbowing her in the side, but the damage is done. He’s actually gonna have to teach them, out of pure spite.

He sighs and stands up, stretching. “Okay, uh. You guys like math? We’re gonna do math.”

He scrawls the first problem on the board- long division, disgusting- and points at the class randomly. “Lawrence? You’re up, dude.”

Lawrence blanches, eyes wide. “I, um- uh-“

Dewey notices Tomika tightening her grip on his arm as Lawrence stammers. Dewey’s about to let him off the hook, not intent on doing any damage to the poor kid, when Lawrence stops stuttering and then just _disappears_ all together.

Just gone, into thin air. 

The kids all stare at each other for a second before several things happen at once:

Tomika starts feeling around next to her, because apparently thin air is going to help the situation; 

Zack and Kade get up at once and pull Billy and Summer behind them, the class all lumping together in front of Lawrence’s desk;

And Freddy, from the back, pushes his seat out and stomps up to Dewey, fists clenched. “Don’t you move an inch, Finn.” 

Dewey puts his hands up. “What would I do? I’m just a bit worried, a whole child just disappeared, dude.”

Freddy glares up at him as Tomika screams in victory, Dewey pushing through the children to find Lawrence back in his seat, shaking. 

“Are you okay?” Dewey asks, Lawrence pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose and grabbing for Tomika’s hands. 

“Fine, yes.” 

“What happened?”

Lawrence opens his mouth and Summer cuts him off without hesitation. “No.”

“But he’s-“

“We can’t! We _can’t_.”

The classroom explodes into noise and Dewey watches Kade drop like a stone, arms over her head, blocking her ears.

He finally puts two and two together.

“You’re a mutant?”

Lawrence glances at Summer and she throws up her hands. “Fine! Tell him! You remember what happened last time? Huh?”

As she rants, Dewey finally notices that her mouth isn’t moving an inch. 

“Summer?” Billy says, meekly.

“What?” 

“You’re projecting again.”

Summer’s hand flies up to her mouth and she curses so violently Dewey can’t help but laugh. 

“Well, that’s a record ten minutes before we fuck it up, huh?” Freddy still looks angry, pushing past Dewey to pull Lawrence up, checking him over in a gentler way than Dewey would have credited him able. 

Summer crosses her arms. “Happy, Mr. Finn? You’ve got a classroom full of mutie freaks. We’ll wait for your resignation to go through.”

And Dewey can’t do much of anything except laugh, a little hysterically, spreading his hands. “I cannot fucking believe this.”

Zack pulls Kade up from the floor, narrowing his eyes. “If you try anything-“

“No!” Dewey shakes his head, the last of his giggles dying out. “No way, holy shit. I just mean-“

He rushes for his suitcase, pulling his Walkman out of it and plugging in his headphones. “Watch this.”

Rock n’ Roll High School starts blasting in his ears and he nods along to the beat, feet leaving the ground and eyes glowing a soft blue. His head bumps against the ceiling as the chorus starts, the children watching him in shock and- in Freddy’s case- utter delight.

He flips himself upside down and grins at them. “God, I wish I had a camera to take a picture of your faces.” 

He floats back down. “So, yeah, surprise, me too. How many of you are mutants?”

The kids glance at each other before every single one of them stick their hands in the air.

Oh, Christ, yes.

“Oh, this rules! I thought you were all just little douchebags!” Dewey flaps his hands a little, running up to the board. “What can you guys do?”

Apparently they’ve decided they can trust him, because Summer takes the lead as everyone stumbles back down into their seats. “Lawrence teleports and goes invisible, as you saw. Kade has supersenses and superspeed. Zack is a shapeshifter. Tomika is invulnerable. I’m a telepath. Freddy’s got a weird tongue and he can stick to walls. Frankie is super strong, Leo can control fire, Marta does sonic screaming, Alicia can go through walls. Billy, uh-“

Billy stands up, putting a finger over Summer’s mouth. “I got this.”

He pulls off his blazer.

Well, that explains why he was hunching.

The kid’s got a full set of wings, probably six feet across on each side, dyed bright neon colors. 

Dewey’s gonna lose his mind- holy fucking shit, the kid’s a bird, and a fashionista to boot. This is the single best thing that could have possibly happened.

Billy tucks his wings back in but doesn’t put on his blazer again, and Dewey doesn’t protest, instead sitting on his desk and swinging his legs. “Does the rest of the school know?”

“No.” Summer sighs. “Mrs. Jacobs found out and I wiped her mind and made Ms. Mullins think she broke her leg.”

“It was so badass,” Freddy crows. “Like, these are not the droids you’re looking for, Ms. Mullins. It was so rad.”

Summer pushes him over. “It was a last resort. Our parents would kill us. And hate us.”

“More than they already do, anyway,” Zack mutters.

Dewey stops cold. 

Shit, is he gonna have to adopt these kids?

**Author's Note:**

> Comment prompts or ideas for the next chapter!!! I might bring in the X-men or something like that!!
> 
> Also, there’s at least one weapon x kid in here- bonus if you guess which two kids they are!!!


End file.
